Everyday Horror: Roadkill Blues

Everything is fine and dandy until you see something dead on the side of the road.

Some kind of four-legged mammal…torn open…ruby tissue…chunks of mangled biology. A feast for the crows and worms. Roadkill is something many of us see everyday. This typical mammalian sun blasted gore may even blend into the environment. Oh…there’s a daisy patch over there…a piss stained fire hydrant near the mailbox…oh! And a pregnant deer that was eviscerated by something very heavy and traveling at high-speed.

I’ll let you guess what did the killing.

Mashed squirrel and other squashed rodents decorate paved roads. Sure, sure—there are other victims: armadillo, frogs, skunks, raccoons, possums, if it lives and breathes, then chances are, it was killed by something very heavy traveling at high speed.

Why did the chicken cross the road? It didn’t!

The chicken

got

hit

by

a

fucking car.

The chicken should have picked a different time to cross the road, right?

What are we supposed to do? Slam on the brakes while trying to find an acceptable tune on the radio? Ha!

Sometimes a life is cut short by another life traveling much faster. Think about it. You hop in your little car. You blast the tunes. You roll down the window. You start to sing…

THUD!

Wait. Did you just hit something? The car tire rolled over something. You can remember seeing something small…something furry…nahhhh. No way! You’re always diligent. There’s no way it was a chipmunk. They’re too tiny and wouldn’t work as a significantly noticeable biological speed-bump…right?

By the time you care about the thing smeared upon the pavement, it already passed you by—just another reflection within the car’s rear-view mirror.

We become desensitized to the little horrors around us.

The next time you’re in control of something very heavy traveling at high-speed: pay special attention to the lost lives spattered on the side of the road. And then turn up the tunes while accelerating into the future. You’re destined for great things, kid.

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Speaking of frogs. Long time ago in Texas, my friend slept in her open trailer and when she woke up, she felt something tickling her forehead, so she smacked her forehead with her hand. She gets up and looks in the mirror and sees a smashed frog on her forehead. Since then, she’s acquired a toady look. The end. You can scream now, along with the roadkill blues . . . twang, twang, whack, twang, whack, and more . . .

Dear Mr Donovan, a ‘friend’ of mine has a question. If one accidentally runs over something and can see that it’s still alive – but not very, should one a) finish the job as an act of mercy, b) give last rights in the hope that they chose the right prayer for the critter’s religion, or c) just drive away and pretend that the twitching thing in the rear-view is just another flappy piece o’ litter? Yours sincerely, A. Fan.

I can’t tell what my car has done on those dark roads
my eye site ain’t so great at nite
There was this road I had to take going home too many nite
It was death ala cart
Sad but true
The Sheldon Perspective

Around here, small roadkill is often referred to as sail-whatever…like sail-cat, sail-chicken, sail-armadillo, you get the idea. When something is run over multiple times, it flattens out into a splat, then hardens. Then one can pick it up by the edge and “sail” it through the air like a frisbee.